by S. K. Falls
Elara leaves for work soon after that—she says she spends most every night at the yez. I check on Ceres, but she is already fast asleep, cocooned in bundles of blankets and sheets. She sleeps with one hand curled tightly into a fist by her head, and I have a flash of a memory of her as a baby, small and innocent in her nightdress, sucking on a bottle as she fell asleep. I cross her room softly and press my hand to the soft spot on her temple. I hope she can sleep free of nightmares tonight, that she can have just one night of reprieve.
I head into Elara's bedroom and lie down, curled up on one side, my body cradling the baby. The sheets smell like soap and unfamiliar perfume. I cry until I drift off to sleep.
◊ ◊ ◊
Four weeks pass by in this manner. I don’t speak to Shale, but his memories don’t recede. They are embedded in my skin, in my brain, permanent splinters.
Ceres and I are taken to the doctor, given pills and vitamins and regular check-ups so we are as healthy as we can be, under the circumstances. I am reminded of farm animals, kept in optimal condition, given what they need for their emotional and physical development because they serve a purpose to their owners.
But in spite of my resentment, in spite of the hole that yawns open in my chest with every breath I take, I have to admit there are some things that make me smile. One is watching Ceres begin to awaken. I am sure she misses Shale too, though she won’t speak of it. Still, her time in the sun, her friends at the school, and her sessions with Dr. Phoebe all serve as a salve for the years of torture she endured in the Asylum. She even begins to bond with Elara, who, I find, has an easy friendship with her. Ceres brings out a child-like side to her that I imagine only ever came out when she was around her daughter. And in Ceres’s eyes, I see a gratitude that I am surprised to find. She is thankful that Elara chose us, and, therefore, chose her. It is the first time anyone besides Shale or I have ever done so.
CHAPTER TWENTY SIX
The most oppressive months of winter—January and February—cause me to sleep deeper and heavier than I have yet. My unwieldy, rapidly-growing body eagerly takes every opportunity it can to rest and rejuvenate. Sometimes I slumber through Ceres leaving for school and don’t awaken until she comes home, a whole day having slipped through my fingers like a silk ribbon. I like it this way. The pregnancy has done me a favor I did not expect—it keeps me from thinking about Shale because I am too exhausted much of the time. When I do think of him, it is to wonder how he is faring. Has he sought comfort in Ananke’s arms? I find myself hoping he hasn’t, that he’s waiting for me, but then I am overcome with guilt. I don’t know if I will ever be able to make my way back to him. Isn’t it best if he finds happiness now, with someone safe, someone present?
One afternoon in March, I am jolted from a nap by the sound of the front door closing. I struggle to sit up; the baby is growing so much that I can barely balance. I forget that I protrude out much farther than I used to. I rub my face, trying to clear my foggy head, and walk out to the living room.
I hear Ceres laughing and Elara’s muffled response. I follow the sounds to the kitchen. Elara stands there, surrounded by bags of food. I see the protruding leaves of some vegetable, and on the table a big bottle of cold milk sits dripping condensation.
"Ah," Elara says, turning to me with a smile. "Sleep well?"
I shake my head and blink slowly. "I was just resting." I look around at the food, bewildered. "Are we having company tonight?"
Ceres giggles; the high-pitched sound of it echoes through my ears, lifts my heart. "No. Elara is c-cooking...for you." My heart lifts, too, at how much better her speech has gotten from being around other healthy children.
"And for the baby," Elara rushes to add, her cheeks turning a light crimson color. She rummages in the bags and begins to pull out everything. "Salmon," she says, indicating a pink slab of fish. "It's good here, not poisoned, like in New Amana. Beets; they're good for the blood, as is broccoli. And we can eat them with some brown rice." She looks at me. "There's milk, if you're thirsty."
"Thank you." Still dazed, I pour myself and Ceres a glass.
I gesture to the milk jug, but Elara shakes her head. "I prefer the stronger stuff, but thank you."
"So...what brought this on?" It's not as if Elara isn't generous with her means; Ceres and I haven't wanted for anything in the eight weeks we've been here. But still...getting so much fresh food cannot be easy. Even if she is a higher-up, she is still New Amanian, restricted to the rations the Chinese government deems fit to give her.
"I have a contact who works in Beijing," she says, getting a knife from the drawer and beginning to slice up the beets. The silver blade winks in the overhead light. "I asked if she could bring some fresh food. I've been speaking with some of the other New Amanian officials. I'd forgotten how needy the body is during pregnancy. How many nutrients it needs, how much care you have to take. It's been so long." She looks at me, a hint of a sad smile playing on her lips. "When I was pregnant, I ate my vitamins but I didn't have access to all of this. We'll make sure the baby gets everything he needs." In spite of my intuition, Elara insists the baby will be a boy.
My heart spasms as a memory of Shale comes unbidden to me, as they often do in spite of the lock I have on the mental box that holds them. I remember when we were in Ursa, he cooked for me once. I told him I'd enjoyed cooking, too, before the government took away my materials. So he'd gone to le marché noir and procured a whole collection of cooking utensils as a gift.
It had been one of his first acts of sacrifice and rebellion for me, and even at the time, I hadn't realized how much it had meant to me, how much he was making an indelible mark on my heart.
Now, I struggle to balance my anger at Elara for taking me away from him, my gratitude for bringing me this food for the baby, and the confusion at feeling both emotions so strongly and simultaneously. More than anything, I ache to put my arms around Shale's neck, to just let him hold me and bear the weight for a moment. I wonder where he is right at this moment. Is he with Ananke? And if he is, how can I blame him?
I haven’t attempted to reach out to him, because Elara has expressly forbidden it. It could doom not just Ceres and me, but her as well. And also, I know it will be easier for Shale this way. A clean break, no looking back, no pining for what we can’t have.
"I think I'll go sit down, rest my feet for a bit," I say, leaving the room with my milk. Ceres and Elara are both completely quiet in my wake, watching me go.
◊ ◊ ◊
I sit in the living room by the window, reading a book. In the past months, I’ve been devouring all the wonderful stories Marisa has lent me when she delivers Elara’s goods for the yez. I am not allowed to go to the yez—in case any of the Monitors recognize me—so Marisa makes sure to pack me books. It’s more than just the novelty of reading for pleasure. When I pick up a book, I step through to another place, one where my own worries and heartbreaks dissipates, like the last fading notes of a sad song. I like this sense of ceasing to exist, and I especially crave it when I find myself missing Shale or thinking about my past life. When I cannot bring myself to masquerade as Elara’s grateful companion, when I cannot bring myself to hide the anger and disgust I feel at her actions, reading is my only solace.
The book I am currently reading is about Japanese customs. Marisa gave it to me when I saw her a few days ago, and I’ve found learning about a new culture fascinating. I learn that kintsukuroi is the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery with gold or silver lacquer, thus leaving the broken piece even lovelier for having been damaged. The beauty of this concept stuns me, and I think of all the people in my life I could apply it to. Soon, as I lose myself in the words, the air fills with the spicy, salty, earthy smells of herbs that make my mouth water. I smell the fish baking. I am hungrier than I realized.
Ceres and Elara are speaking quietly in the kitchen, their unintelligible words punctuated by the quiet clinks of metal on metal, pots and pans being loaded with food. When Elara walks out to the liv
ing room to tell me it’s time to eat, I look up and smile. "It smells delicious."
Her answering smile is cooler than before. "I'm glad to hear it."
We sit together at a small table in the kitchen, the baby pressing into the edge of the wood. I eat two helpings hungrily as Elara picks at her rice and swigs her wine. Ceres does not care for the fish, so she sticks to the vegetables and rice.
"Elara's grandmother...taught her t-to cook," Ceres says when the silence has stretched out like a hot piece of plastic in the sun. "She...she was a ch-chef before the War."
"She was a slave to her time." Elara's tone is bitter; I look up, startled at her change of mood. "If it weren't for my mother, I wouldn't have grown up to be the independent, thinking woman I am. Never forget that, Ceres. Love is good, but strength is what matters. It is the legacy we must pass on to our daughters." She eyes me over her glass as she says this, and I wonder what she means.
I have learned to steer clear of Elara when she drinks. Though she has never tried to hurt me, she gets a subtle sharp edge to her that can draw blood if you get too close.
Ceres returns to her plate, eating quietly. It seems to me I've done a respectable job of keeping her away from Elara when Elara gets this way, but something about the darkness in her expression makes me wonder if she's seen and been the brunt of things more often than I realize.
I clear my throat in the silence. "Ceres, if you're done, you should get started on your homework."
She catches my eye and there's a grateful glint in it; she knows I am giving her a chance to escape. "Th-thank you for the...meal, Elara." She puts her dishes away and then retreats to her room.
When we hear her door close, Elara sets her cup down and turns to me. "You're still pining for him, aren't you?"
I look down at my plate. All that remains are a few traces of the red juice of the beets, like blood after a war. "I miss him, yes." Then I look back up at her. I’m not sure why I say this now, but it has been lurking in the back of my mind like a caged wild rat, pacing relentlessly all these weeks. “Tell me something. Was it you? Were you the one who told them they had a pregnant fugitive on their compound?”
Elara laughs—the sound is a cold, bitter thing. "I would think two months would be quite enough to let go, Vika. Of a Husband you barely knew." She says Husband like it's a dirty word. Then she pauses and takes a deep gulp of her wine. “Can you blame me? You were going to ruin everything by staying with him. You were putting your own child’s life, your sister’s life, in jeopardy. I did the only thing I could think of to prod you along.”
I swallow my anger at the way she says the words so casually, as if it were her utter right to rip me from the man I love. I hold my hands pressed against my stomach so that I do not hit her. I breathe, I focus on the fact that Ceres and the baby are here, that they are safe, that that is what I had wanted all along. And I decide something in that moment: I won’t be Elara’s quiet, kept woman anymore. Perhaps I’d been acting out of a misplaced sense of loyalty before, or out of gratitude that she took us in. But she’s admitted that she put us in this position in the first place. She doesn’t deserve any loyalty, any of my gratitude.
My heart races as I formulate a plan. I’m going to ask for Marisa’s help in contacting Shale. I’m going to find a way for us to see each other. I have plenty of time in the day when Elara isn’t watching me, when she’s at work or the yez. Energy surges through me. As if she can taste it, the baby lunges and pushes against the table, irritated at being confined in so small a space. It is as if she, too, wants to fly free.
I force myself to look Elara in the eye, to sound sincere as I say, "I'm grateful for everything you've done for me and Ceres, Elara. I promise...I’ll try harder." Can she honestly expect me to? Does she believe that I could completely erase Shale from my mind like dust off a chalkboard?
Her eyes glitter with tears. I am taken aback. "All I want," she whispers, "is a family. One that'll love me for who I am, for what I provide: shelter, food, safety. That's not too much to ask, is it?"
As I stare into her eyes, I wonder how long she has been this way; burning and desperate, yet detached and calculating at once. Since losing her daughter? Even before that? I force myself to hold her broken gaze.
"No," I reply. "It's not too much to ask at all." I force a smile, though it is like forcing splinters of wood under my skin.
She smiles back and pours herself more wine. I close my eyes and pat my belly, trying to comfort both myself and my baby.
◊ ◊ ◊
Later, I lie in the bed, curled on one side, thinking of anything I can so I don’t have space in my mind to think of what Elara has all but confessed to. Shale was right. I thought he just needed to hate someone, to blame someone for our fate, but he was right. Elara leaked information about my pregnancy to the Monitors at the compound. She was the one who told them about me. She forced my hand. I breathe in. I breathe out. I think of rain, of children’s songs, of Alice in Wonderland, of white rabbits and mad hatters and rooms that are too big and people who are too small.
I shift. I cannot get used to sleeping in such a vast bed; it feels strange to me to have so much space. How did Elara manage to sleep before I came to stay? If I move beyond the imaginary rectangle I have created for myself, I fear I will fall.
My stomach moves, a bump-de-bump. A moment later, it happens again. The baby must have hiccups. I count with her: one hiccup, two hiccups, three. I wonder at the marvelous thought that I can feel what she is doing before she is even a person outside of me. One day I’ll tell her there was a time when she and I were one person, one identity, one breath. I keep racing ahead with my disjointed thoughts, eager not to think of the person I’m living with; the woman who betrayed me, ripped Shale and me apart, and gave my family shelter all at the same time.
I have to plan how I can get a message to Shale. The best place to do it would be at the black market. Could I convince Marisa to take me? Could she get a message to him to meet me there one night? My heart races with the possibility. What would it be like, to see his face again after all this time? Perhaps to hold his hand, to let him take me in his embrace? To feel the heat of his skin—
A shadow falls on me and I blink in the near-darkness, trying to see. It is Elara. I smell her wine, sweet but with a bite of metal. I close my eyes so she won’t try to speak to me.
She fumbles in the darkness, trying to get her nightclothes on, and then climbs into the bed, under the covers. I wait for her to fall asleep and begin to snore her wispy, light snores, but tonight she puts her slender hand on my hip. I stiffen. She moves toward me—I feel her weight shift the mattress—and puts her face in my hair. She inhales deeply, as if she is breathing in my essence. Then she plants a soft kiss on the nape of my neck and buries her face in my shoulder.
So tonight is when it will happen. This has been a long time coming. Since we arrived, I’ve wondered when Elara will demand from me what I know she must want, what any couple in a relationship share. Intimacy. I feel the acrid taste of bile in the back of my throat, disgust at having to make love with someone I abhor to the core of my soul.
She puts one hand on my shoulder and tugs. I turn to face her. Her eyes shine in the darkness, and she fumbles to put her drunken mouth on mine. I close my eyes and float away to a place where Shale and I are still together.
CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN
The next morning I sit with my aching back pressed against the rocking chair in my bedroom. The window showcases a world at war with itself, the gray sky spewing, the trees and brown grass pelted with needles of rain. I feel it in my own heart, something bleak and dark brewing. Elara has given us safety from being discovered...but it isn’t safe here. She betrayed me once and she can do it again. How much longer until she breaks? What if, once the baby comes, she decides to take the baby and turn me and Ceres in to the Chinese?
I grip the arms of the rocker, fear seeping in quick and churning. Last night I thought about being with Shale
privately, about having a relationship with him while I lived with Elara for Ceres and the baby. But now, with a night’s sleep, I see we have to leave. Elara cannot be trusted. But if we do leave, there is a good chance that we will be caught. And not just us, but Shale, too. What do you do in such a circumstance? There is nothing to do, I realize, but talk to Shale. He wants exactly what I want. We can plan together what to do next.
I rush to Elara’s library and grab a pen and paper. I’ll write a note asking Shale to meet me at the black market. He can’t read, but Ananke can. I am sure she will help.
I grip the pen hard, struggling with how to word things. I take a deep breath and begin the note. As soon as I begin, the words smear. I can’t stop the tears.
I think of you every moment of every day. I want to see you at the black market one night this week—when? Send word through A. I love you.
I do not sign my name; there is no need. Now I must convince Marisa to help me get this to Shale through Ananke. As if she’s read my mind, there is a knock on the door. My heart races as I make my way to the living room to open it.
Marisa waits in the sheeting rain, a bright red raincoat on over her gray clothes. When she sees my expression, her smile fades. “Míngqín. Is everything all right?”
I try to smile, to reassure her, but I can’t. It feels like my bone marrow has been replaced with lead. “Come in.”
Once the door is closed behind her, she takes off the hood of the raincoat. Rivulets of water slither down the plastic of the red coat like bloody snakes. “You didn’t answer my question.”
I place one hand on my stomach. “I’m fine, I promise. Just feeling a little...”
“Out of sorts?”
I nod, deciding I will wait to ask her my favor. I’ve lost my nerve and feel I must bide my time. Though we are friends, I am not sure how far the bonds of Marisa’s friendship really extend.
She smiles kindly and places one hand on my arm. In spite of her having just come in from the rain, it feels warm and solid. “That’s not so uncommon in pregnancy. I think I know what might help. How about we get you out of here?”
